The Atlantis Oval

With the action taking place between a River End and a Cathedral End, Adelaide Oval has always seemed a bastion during the cricket summer of almost ecclestiastical tranquillity. Sad to say, twixt river and cathedral the visitor is greeted by a building site that in places more closely resembles a bomb site. Ian Chappell says he does not even know where the bar named for him is any more. Frankly, he’ll be hard pressed to find the commentary box.

It is an oval in playing surface only; what remains of the stands form a crescent to the north and west. Players of cross-bat shots who always enjoy value for money here, are set for even richer rewards, the proverbially short square boundaries having been shaved by a further six metres. They will also be uttering obsequies in this game over the square, the best in Australia, which will be dug up in due course and replaced by pitches on drop-in trays…all for the sake of football, which is, of course, the purpose of the whole exercise. A beautiful cricket ground is being entombed beneath a state-of-the-art sportainment megalopolis. It will become cricket’s version of the lost city of Atlantis.

Cricket is putting the best face on it. Because the ground’s crowd capacity has been nearly halved, the SACA is boasting of a sell out on the first three days. It’s a pity about the sell out that’s already taken place.

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